by Viki Storm
I lunge up, tackling him at the waist. I land on top of him, driving the air out of his lungs. He whoofs a noxious cloud of breath onto my face, spraying me with blood. His nose looks like a chewed-up wad of meat, but his eyes are clear and burning with hate.
His anankah is on the ground next to us and I reach for it—resisting the urge to shoot him with it. Our weapons are great tools, but they are only tools. Our true danger—our real violence—lies in our own lethal hearts. I press the weapon across his neck and lean my full weight into it. He sucks in air with high-pitched keening gasps and soon his chest is hitching, his lungs rebelling.
Then he is still.
I don’t check to see if he is alive. I don’t care. I climb into the ship and latch the door behind me. I sweep through the hallways and glance into the rooms. I shudder to remember the time I spent on this ship, complicit and compliant, ready to participate in the cruel raids of these rebels.
I go to the command center and fire up the engines. I haven’t piloted a ship like this in a long time, and even then my training was minimal. I always had more skilled pilots to control the ships when I led raids—and now I hope my own ignorance will not come back to haunt me.
I lift off without trouble and steer a big circle to turn myself around. For a brief moment I can see the two bodies of the guard and Zuro on the ground, but they soon merge into the landscape, appearing no bigger than two lumpy rocks.
I find the pavilion on my screen and lock its coordinates. Noxu and the Kraxx warlord will be there after giving their rousing speeches, either shaking hands with their supporters or retiring to the tent to draw up plans.
Either way, they’re going to be nothing but a dusty pile of calcified bones in a few minutes. I start initiating the missiles and entering the code sequence necessary to launch them.
This is really going to happen, I think. I’m really going to vaporize them—and be in the perfect position to escape. After I drop the missiles, I’m going to put it into warp and get this void-loving ship into the void and back to Zalaryx so I can claim my mate.
And claim her I shall.
I’m almost giddy at my impending success, the thought of having Aren in my arms again. I might never let her go.
But I push these thoughts aside, knowing that vainglory is not going to help me achieve success. I need to focus on the missile sequence. If I miss one stroke, I will have to start over. If I miss another stroke, it will lock me out of the system for several minutes—an attempt to keep only cool hands at the controls of weapons as powerful as these.
Focus I do. I am oblivious to everything around me.
Like the cold steel at my neck. It takes me a minute to realize what it is.
A knife.
A trickle of blood runs down my neck and seeps into my cloak.
“This is my lucky day,” he says. It is the captain of this ship, Ingzan. “When I sang a song of prayer to the fates that I might meet you again, I didn’t expect my prayers to be answered so fast. So literally. The fates must like blood as much as I do.”
“It’s too late,” I say. “The launch sequence is complete. The coordinates are locked.”
“Too late?” he says and actually laughs. His dry chuckle jounces the blade in his hand and it slices a little deeper into my flesh, like a fiddler plying his bow to the strings of his chosen instrument.
“They’re all going up in flame,” I say.
“Not all of us,” he says, laughter in his voice. I dare not turn around and push my neck into the blade any deeper, but I can imagine his crooked teeth and sinister grin. “Did you come to assassinate the rebel leader? My dear father? How cute. Let the old bastard burn. Let his herd of bleating sheep go with him. I’ll be the one to lead. Hopefully that Kraxx void-sucker will get it too. I’ll take his mantel as well. The Kraxx will be enraged when they find out that their leader has been ambushed by a coward pressing buttons from high up in the air. I’ll gather them and we’ll destroy everything you hold dear. I’ll start with that little cunt from Yrdat. She’d make a nice reward for my legion of Kraxx.”
“You’ll never—” I start to say. But I don’t finish, because everything goes black.
He opens the door and steps into the room first. The room is large and dark, filled with many males sitting at tables. I’m glad that I’ve already had the experience of being with Captain Ingzan and his rowdy regiment. His vile speech and violent tendencies have prepared me well for the atmosphere of the auction house.
The aliens whoop and whistle as I’m led around. Osyr tugs on the leash attached to my collar, making me stumble and struggle to match his pace. My hands are bound behind my back and it’s hard to keep my balance. As I pass through the rows of males, I feel their hands on my body. Most of them grab roughly at my thighs and ass, but one of the aliens reaches up and tweaks my nipple painfully—and then belches out a bray of sick laughter when I yelp from the pain.
One of the males tells the jailer to stop. “I like the looks of this one,” the male says. He’s old, his red skin hanging off his face like melted globs of wax. His nose is canted at an odd angle, and the nostrils are unusually flat against his face—like the slits of a serpent’s nose.
“Have a look,” Osyr says. “She is healthy and strong. Twenty-two years old. You might get ten or fifteen years of work out of her.”
Endless blackened void, did he say ten years? Is that what these randy bastards do? Of course it is. My parents knew. Everyone on Earth knows. These lustful creatures need fresh faces, fresh bodies.
We are disposable.
They consume us and throw us away.
“Bend over,” the old, waxy serpent says. He reaches up and gives my breast a quick, noncommittal squeeze. Osyr yanks my collar and pulls me down. My face is pressed against the table and my ass is sticking up in the air. The surface of the table is tacky and I’m sure that I could scrape my thumbnail across the surface and unearth a gummy wad of dark residue. Except, of course, my hands are tied behind my back.
The old, waxy serpent gets up from his chair with a belabored groan. As if it is almost too much trouble to inspect the wares. He grunts again, noncommittally. His affected disinterest reminds me of the old ladies at the market stalls, trying hard not to let their interest show, lest the vendor take advantage.
“Not pure,” he says.
“Unfortunately not,” Osyr says. “But her price is greatly reduced.”
“Hmm,” the serpent says. “That might be reasonable. Let me take her to the private inspection room.”
“Five minutes,” the staff says. He pulls my leash and I do trip this time. Without my arms free to break my fall, I land on the floor. “Get up,” he says, and prods my back with the toe of his boot. I manage to pull myself up. The three of us walk to the so-called private inspection room. The staff opens the door and I see that there is a small mattress and a wash basin. He gives me a little push and I step into the room. The old serpent follows me, a wide grin on his fat face makes me rethink things. Not a serpent. A frog. He looks like a frog. Maybe a toad.
“Let’s see how much she’s worth,” the old alien says.
Osyr hands him the end of the leash and closes the door. He looks at me one last time and says: “Obey all commands.”
The door closes behind me and the fat old toad tells me to lie down on the bed. I’m stunned. There is no way I’m going to listen to him. And, if he gets close enough, I’m going to bite him. Then I’m going to kick him in the balls.
Then I’m probably going to wish I hadn’t, because they will surely execute me for such behavior. No one wants to own a slave they have to worry about slitting their throats in the night.
“On the bed,” he repeats. “If you give me any trouble, I’ll stick it in your ass instead. It’s your choice.”
My choice? I haven’t had any choice about anything in my entire life. No choice when the Zalaryns Marked me. No choice when my parents decided to leave everything and go into hiding on a tiny dusty
planet. No choice when they died, and left me stranded there alone. I haven’t had a choice about anything.
That’s not true, I think. I chose to leap out of the closet and try to stab Droka. And I whispered in his ear to put it in.
Maybe everything really is my fault. Maybe I deserve this fate.
Or maybe Fate is what made you leap out. Fate is what made you whisper in his ear. The only two real decisions you ever made in your entire life.
And maybe they are the two things you regret the least.
Maybe.
Then the old bastard takes a step towards me, his hands at his sides balled into fists. Though he’s fat and old, there are still thick cords of muscle in his arms. “Alright then,” he says, “up the ass. That’s the way a lot of our paying customers like to do it anyway. They like it better when you struggle and weep.” He pulls on my leash, but I stand firm. He’s not getting my obedience. That is one thing I will never surrender to these bastards.
That’s when the door pops open again. Hands clamp down on my shoulders.
“Come on,” he says. It’s Osyr. He pulls me out the door, the other end of my leash slipping out of the toad’s hands.
“Hey,” the toad says, sounding like a little kid who is told that not only is the game over, but that he lost.
“She’s not for sale,” the staff says. Not for sale?
“What do you mean?” I say. Is it too much to hope?
“We got another comm from Captain Ingzan’s ship. He says to hold you. He’s already wired the payment into the auction house account.”
“He bought me?” I say. I’m not sure if I’m relieved or not. Ingzan is cruel and sadistic—and he will want revenge for my escape.
“He is off-planet right now,” Osyr says. “But he’ll be back to claim you shortly. Apparently he doesn’t care if you have been defiled. He’s paying a very high price for you. The second-highest in our history.”
I say nothing. For a scoundrel like that, money would be no object. What he really cares about is making me pay. He wanted something and I thwarted him. He can’t get to Droka, so he’ll punish us both by purchasing me. He’ll probably send image files of my torture and humiliation to Droka, to show him who was the true victor.
Yes, I might be better off working in the toad’s brothel.
It takes every ounce of my remaining strength to watch as Aren gets into my vehicle, as the auction staff member shoves her into the open door and tells her to shut up. I want to get out and clout him on the head for that, but I can’t.
Everyone in the capitol knows my face. Everyone in the capitol wants to clasp my hands and buy me a cup of freykka and listen to my tale.
Listen to how I assassinated the fiercest warlord in the quadrant. How I murdered both the rebel leader Noxu and his spoiled son Ingzan.
I am a hero.
Funny, because I don’t feel like one. I feel like a coward. Letting the peacekeepers take Aren. Killing the rebel leaders from up in the air rather than face to face in righteous combat.
The auction staff shuts the vehicle door and I set the course for my dwelling outside the city. It’s the only place I can go.
When the vehicle glides into motion, sweeping over the narrow city streets and navigating through the crooked turns, I take down my hood and look at her.
“Are you hurt?” I ask. She’s sitting next to me in the vehicle. I want to slide over next to her, so close that her hips and shoulders press into mine.
But if I was her, I would be looking for a knife. I would want to finish the job that I set out to do back in her dwelling on Yrdat.
“It’s… holy void,” she says. “I thought…”
All at once, her body is wracked with sobs so violent I fear she might cough up one of her lungs. I slide across the seat and take her into my arms, feeling her distress pour out of her like the caustic, acidic rains of her home planet.
“I am so sorry,” I say. “I’ll spend the rest of my life atoning for how I’ve treated you. I am not fit to be your mate, but I feel our bond is true and unsevered. I will do everything in my power to ensure your happiness. If you wish to return to Earth—”
But I can’t finish my sentence. She slugs me on the arm. Her tiny fist is pitifully weak and I would laugh were the circumstances different.
“Don’t you dare,” she says. “Don’t you dare leave me again.” She looks at me, her eyes shiny with tears, but there is a smile on her face. I kiss that smiling mouth, her soft lips parting, the tip of her tongue dancing with mine for a brief moment before she pulls back.
“I have acted shamefully,” I say. “I broke my oath to the Imperial Guard. I broke my promise to you—the promise that I would keep you safe. I let two other males take away my bonded mate and put her up for auction. This is the most cowardly, dishonorable thing a Zalaryn male can do. I have failed you.”
“You failed me?” she says, as if she cannot understand my shame. Maybe she can’t. Humans are odd creatures with an even odder social structure. “The peacekeepers used lethal force to take me. And even still, you clobbered one of them so badly that his ear didn’t stop bleeding all the way to the auction house. He even spit out a tooth when we got there. What were you supposed to do? Keep fighting until they killed you? Then what? Then I’d still be inside that horrible place, waiting to be purchased like a hog at the farmer’s market.”
“A Zalaryn Warrior should fight to the death to protect what he holds dear. His king, his fellow warriors—and his bonded mate most of all.”
“That is honorable,” she says. I can tell she is choosing her words carefully, so she does not offend me. “But it is not altogether practical. I’m glad you let them take me, because if you were wounded or killed or in the dungeon, you’d never have been able to come back for me.”
She caresses the side of my face with her small, cool hand. It feels so good, like she’s washing away the taint of my past. Clearing the way for our new future together. I take hold of her hand and kiss the knuckles. She crawls into my lap and for a while I just hold her, not believing that I have her safe in my arms again. It’s more than I’d hoped for.
More than I deserved.
Her kind words. Her beautiful face. Her kiss. They’ve lifted the burden of my guilt—and I begin to entertain the notion that I did act rationally.
Or, at the very least, the fates that guided me to Aren in the first place were not so easily discouraged. They guided me on a long and looping, treacherous course—but a course that was always going to lead back to her.
“I thought you were Ingzan,” she finally says. We’re outside the capitol and the landscape is bare: nothing but scattered brush and the red, rocky, hard-pan that covers most of our planet.
“Ingzan?” I say, confused. “I can assure you, he is dead.”
“In the auction house, they said I’d been purchased. They said there was a comm from the Screaming Talon. That there was a transmission of coin from his personal account.”
“Indeed there was,” I say, smiling. In a way, Ingzan bought her after all.
I tell her how I went back to New Pallas and sneaked aboard his ship. “He was on the ship, and got the best of me when I was flying towards the rebel camp. He put a knife to my throat.” She gasps and pulls down the collar of my hooded tunic. There are still flakes of dried blood on my skin. I haven’t had time to wash. “He was behind me, the knife at my throat, and began to slice. I was strapped into the pilot’s chair. There was no way out.”
“So what did you do?”
“I stayed right where I was,” I say. “And hit the button to open the emergency escape hatch. He was sucked out of the ship as fast as you could sneeze.”
“So, he’s dead?” she asks, as if the thought of him returning for her would cause her many sleepless nights.
“I’d already broken past the New Pallas atmosphere,” I say. “There is no way he could have survived the fall.”
“Does that mean you were really high in the air?”
she asks.
“Yes,” I say. I cock my thumb behind us. “The height of the Imperial Fortress? That’s seventeen stories. I was at least 20 times that high.”
“Twenty times?” she says and I can see her relax.
“Where are we going now?” she says.
“Home,” I say.
“Your home?” she says.
“No,” I say. “Our home.” I turn her head gently so she is looking at me. “I will never leave you. I’ll never let anything happen to you. Even if it’s irrational, I will fight until the last beat of my heart—because what I feel for you is not rational. It’s hot and wild and comes from here.” I take her hand in mine, and place it over my chest so she can feel my beating heart.
“I feel it too,” she says, and after a moment, she moves my hand to her chest. I feel her heart beat, much faster than mine. “Since we…” her cheeks turn red and I feel her heartbeat speed up. “… were in your chambers together, I’ve felt an overwhelming, hot, bright ache for you. You say it’s bonding, or hormones, or chemical reactions between our genetic material…”
“It is not that,” I say. “That’s what the healers call it. That is what those of my species who have not experienced it call it. You know as well as I do what it is: it is love. I love you, pure and simple.”
“I love you too—but there’s nothing simple about it,” she says. “If what we’ve just been through is your idea of ‘simple,’ then I don’t want to ever have to deal with anything complicated.”
The vehicle approaches my dwelling. I deactivate the force field and slow the vehicle.
“We’re here,” I say. “And it is simple. I love you. We’re connected now in a way that can never be unbroken. Our destinies are intertwined, like the fibers of a rope. I can’t think of me without thinking of us. It actually simplifies things quite a bit.”
As we exit the vehicle, I see there’s the flickering yellow light of a lantern inside the dwelling. We are not alone.
I open the door and see Xalax, High King, and his Obsidian Queen Resa, standing in my dwelling.